Canadian Retail Thread

[Brizzy82]

that Halifax Ikea looks massive

edit: I guess it's about average, 328,000 sf, just checked Winnipeg for reference which is 395,000


thats great for Halifax though. Honestly I didn't do a ton of shopping at Ikea before Winnipeg got one, I think I had been to the one in Minneapolis twice, but now that it's here I find that we shop there a lot for housewares and small furniture pieces.

[WhipperSnapper]

Originally Posted by hipster duck

They sure are moving a lot of earth for that development.

I think it's ironic that IKEA - a furniture company that is probably one of the biggest symbols of a downscaled urban lifestyle, and "Europeanness" - exclusively builds its stores in the most sprawling, auto-dependent suburban locations imaginable.

I don't think they ever really lived up to that reputation. They were certainly affordably modern however, their selection still wasn't of a particularly smaller scale. I ended up pay double for an apartment sized couch at Eatons back in the day.

[q12]

To be fair from IKEA's press release this will be the most sustainable IKEA store in Canada.

It will be approximately 330,000 square feet (30,700 square meters), which is larger than four football fields in size.

IKEA Halifax will be constructed to operate as the most sustainable IKEA store in Canada, with a particular focus on energy efficiency and waste avoidance, and will be the first LEED certified IKEA store in Canada. Key features of the store will include a rooftop solar photovoltaic installation to provide electricity to the store, geothermal energy generation to support heating and cooling needs, as well as 100% LED lighting. Waste management equipment will be installed to maximize material recycling and diversion from landfill...

http://www.ikea.com/ca/en/about_ikea..._halifax_store

Here is the newly opened IKEA Renton (Seattle) with similar design:

Source:http://www.seattleglobalist.com/2017...allation/60968

[esquire]

Originally Posted by Brizzy82

that Halifax Ikea looks massive

edit: I guess it's about average, 328,000 sf, just checked Winnipeg for reference which is 395,000


thats great for Halifax though. Honestly I didn't do a ton of shopping at Ikea before Winnipeg got one, I think I had been to the one in Minneapolis twice, but now that it's here I find that we shop there a lot for housewares and small furniture pieces.

I was under the impression that the showroom/market areas are pretty standard in North America when it comes to size, the difference tends to be in the warehouse and 'back of the house' areas. In other words, to a shopper, they all kind of look and feel the same regardless of actual square footage.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by Nathan

That's somewhat similar to what they're rolling out over the next while, though not for the benefit of "urbanites". Their plan was to open "IKEA lites" in markets they deem too small for a full-scale IKEA and stock them with ~100 of the most popular items, but to also have a show room and the ability to order in-store/online other items not normally kept on-hand in the warehouse.

I kind of forgot about that announcement... wonder where they're at with that.

Something like that would be awesome, both for cities that are too small for a full-fledged IKEA store, as well as for metros with one store that is far from a large segment of the population. I'm thinking of places like Edmonton where the north side of town is really far from the IKEA location on the south edge of the city. Even if you can't have access to the entire line of IKEA stuff, just the hot seller items like the basic bookcases, armchairs and what-not would be convenient.

The only one of these places I've seen so far was driving through St. Catharines on the QEW last summer.

[WhipperSnapper]

Originally Posted by q12

To be fair from IKEA's press release this will be the most sustainable IKEA store in Canada.



Here is the newly opened IKEA Renton (Seattle) with similar design:

Source:http://www.seattleglobalist.com/2017...allation/60968

The features are pretty much standard in recent big box design with IKEA being no exception so, it's surprising this would be the first LEED certified IKEA

[ue]

I still find it odd that Quebec doesn't have a full-service IKEA store, considering similarly sized Hamilton has had one for awhile and Winnipeg has had one for a few years now and Halifax is getting one now. Surely the market is large enough. That being said, with the national expansion, I presume the days of this are numbered.

Originally Posted by hipster duck

They sure are moving a lot of earth for that development.

I think it's ironic that IKEA - a furniture company that is probably one of the biggest symbols of a downscaled urban lifestyle, and "Europeanness" - exclusively builds its stores in the most sprawling, auto-dependent suburban locations imaginable.

I get that each store is also a self-serve warehouse, but a lot of people come in to IKEA to buy small household items. They could just have an "IKEA lite" for urbanites who want to buy bathmats or plates from the showroom, and give customers the option to order the larger furniture for delivery.

It builds stores like this everywhere, though -- including Europe. It's often the one big box suburban destination to go to with people who otherwise walk or train to shops. I get it to an extent; it is convenient shopping for furniture with a car that you can take all your boxes home in, but still. Even the IKEA Brooklyn is only begrudgingly urban.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by ue

I still find it odd that Quebec doesn't have a full-service IKEA store, considering similarly sized Hamilton has had one for awhile and Winnipeg has had one for a few years now and Halifax is getting one now. Surely the market is large enough. That being said, with the national expansion, I presume the days of this are numbered.

.

A full-sized store has already been announced for Quebec City. It will open in 2018.

Quebec City actually had an IKEA store when I was a kid in the 80s. It closed at one point, I don't know why.

[ue]

Originally Posted by Acajack

A full-sized store has already been announced for Quebec City. It will open in 2018.

Quebec City actually had an IKEA store when I was a kid in the 80s. It closed at one point, I don't know why.

Ah, thank you for the clarification.

Yeah, I know Quebec, along with Halifax and Victoria, used to have smaller IKEA stores.

[q12]

Here is a cool Google maps site with IKEA locations (click on yellow dots for store facts including location sizes and opening dates):

http://worldmapikea-prod.azurewebsit...teractive.html

[Brizzy82]

interesting.

Winnipeg really punches above it's weight in parking spaces & restaurant seats.

Woot!

[hipster duck]

Originally Posted by q12

Here is a cool Google maps site with IKEA locations (click on yellow dots for store facts including location sizes and opening dates):

Cool find!

Man, there are some big US cities that don't have an IKEA: Cleveland, Nashville, New Orleans, Milwaukee, etc.

Didn't realize there weren't any IKEAs in Latin America (except Santo Domingo).

[ue]

Originally Posted by hipster duck

Cool find!

Man, there are some big US cities that don't have an IKEA: Cleveland, Nashville, New Orleans, Milwaukee, etc.

Didn't realize there weren't any IKEAs in Latin America (except Santo Domingo).

Even the cities that do are underserved vis-a-vis Canada. Dallas and Houston have only one store, Chicago only has two, Boston only one, San Francisco only two, Seattle only one, and New York only four.

Compared with Canada where Vancouver has two, Montreal two, Toronto three (or four, depending how you look at it), with metros under a million served with a location.

If Canadian, New York would likely have at least ten stores, Boston two or three, Houston and Dallas two or three, Seattle two, Chicago four, San Francisco four, etc.

[isaidso]

Originally Posted by ue

I still find it odd that Quebec doesn't have a full-service IKEA store, considering similarly sized Hamilton has had one for awhile and Winnipeg has had one for a few years now and Halifax is getting one now. Surely the market is large enough. That being said, with the national expansion, I presume the days of this are numbered.

Halifax was also the first city in north America to get an IKEA so market size isn't always the determining factor. The first store closed so it's nice to see IKEA back in Halifax again.

[Nathan]

Originally Posted by isaidso

I suppose but Halifax was also the first city in north America to get an IKEA so market size isn't always the determining factor.

That was before they started concentrating on having a larger consumer base. Once they did that, some smaller market IKEAs shut down (as mentioned above: Victoria, Halifax, etc)...

And now they are finally going back and expanding to markets that would have been considered too small before. Winnipeg was around the first of these markets in Canada... Well below the 1 mill pop in a city that they used to use as a measure - I know Southern Man has about that and NS does as well, and in a smaller area, but that didn't seem to matter to IKEA before.

That's not a dig, it just seemed to be their strategy. About all Saskatoon or Regina can hope for is one of their "lite" stores, if they ever decide to put one here.

[1overcosc]

Originally Posted by esquire

Something like that would be awesome, both for cities that are too small for a full-fledged IKEA store, as well as for metros with one store that is far from a large segment of the population. I'm thinking of places like Edmonton where the north side of town is really far from the IKEA location on the south edge of the city. Even if you can't have access to the entire line of IKEA stuff, just the hot seller items like the basic bookcases, armchairs and what-not would be convenient.

The only one of these places I've seen so far was driving through St. Catharines on the QEW last summer.

That would be nice. Another possibility could be seasonal pop-up stores around Labour Day in university cities (like Kingston, Waterloo, Sherbrooke, etc.) that could similarly stock only the most popular items with an ordering mechanism for the rest.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by Nathan

And now they are finally going back and expanding to markets that would have been considered too small before. Winnipeg was around the first of these markets in Canada... Well below the 1 mill pop in a city that they used to use as a measure - I know Southern Man has about that and NS does as well, and in a smaller area, but that didn't seem to matter to IKEA before.

Halifax is a small city but it is also a regional centre and a lot of people from around Atlantic Canada will show up there for things that aren't available in their hometowns. When the IKEA in Dartmouth opens I'm guessing the parking lot will feature many NB, PEI, and NF plates.

[Nathan]

Originally Posted by someone123

Halifax is a small city but it is also a regional centre and a lot of people from around Atlantic Canada will show up there for things that aren't available in their hometowns. When the IKEA in Dartmouth opens I'm guessing the parking lot will feature many NB, PEI, and NF plates.

I agree and don't doubt it, but the overall regional population hasn't changed much since they closed down the previous IKEA in Halifax, so their strategy/requirements had to have been what has changed. That's the main gist of what I'm saying with my previous comment.

[SpongeG]

All this IKEA talk is giving me withdrawls. When I am home I probably go to IKEA about 3 times a week, this last time home was about 5 times. I don't know why I go so much. Lucky it's not even 5 minutes driving time, probably why. Saturdays are hell day at IKEA though.

[Taeolas]

Originally Posted by Nathan

I agree and don't doubt it, but the overall regional population hasn't changed much since they closed down the previous IKEA in Halifax, so their strategy/requirements had to have been what has changed. That's the main gist of what I'm saying with my previous comment.

I've heard (but not sure how true it is) that one of the main factors that kicked IKEA out of Halifax originally, was Nova Scotia's sunday shopping laws.

Back then, Nova Scotia (and most of the Maritimes) had very strict "No Sunday Shopping" laws on the books that prevented most businesses from opening on that day.

IKEA was going 7 day a week across the continent, so they were petitioning NS to either relax the Sunday shopping laws, or to get an exemption. NS dug its heels in and say No, so IKEA packed up and left. (Likely Sunday shopping was the straw to break the camel's back; the store may have been borderline and/or out of date already).

Now, I think NS has probably one of the most relaxed business hours acts in the country since they removed the Sunday and Holiday shopping restrictions. I believe technically the only day a regular store can NOT be open is Remembrance Day, due to it being covered under a separate act. There are no other business hour restrictions in the province now. Which was likely a factor in drawing IKEA back into the city.